Hospitalized bedridden patients are at a high risk of developing pneumonia, choking on food or medicines or developing bed sores. These risks can be lowered by closely monitoring the orientation of the patient's upper body. For example, patients on ventilators are especially vulnerable to developing severe pneumonia. Numerous studies have shown that such cases of pneumonia, known as ventilator-associated pneumonia, often can be prevented by elevating the upper body of the patient relative to the lower body.
While elevating the head of the bed is simple in principle, it is elusive in practice. This is because there are many reasons to lower the patient's head during the course of patient care. Some of these reasons include transport, bathing, or bedside medical procedures. Frequently, after the patient's upper body has been lowered for another reason, the clinical care giver forgets to place the patient back in the upper body elevated position. As a result, it is very common for adequate head elevation not to be maintained properly over the course of the bedridden period.
The present invention helps to avoid this problem.